On Friday 17th March, Year 7-8 students spent the day at Willowbank as part of their Science programme.

Students have begun their Ecology unit of work with a special emphasis on Aotearoa New Zealand endemic and native birds. Willowbank was an ideal learning environment to closely observe birds such as Kea, Weka, Kaka, Kakariki and of course let's not forget the Kiwi. The drawcard of Willowbank is that it is also the home of many other interesting animals such as Capybara, Otters, Siamese Gibbons as well as examples of domesticated animals.

Students honed their scientific investigation skills with observation, use of ethograms and ethogram tally charts. The data collected will be used back in the classroom over the coming weeks. While our ākonga may only be ten and eleven years old, the skills they are learning will provide a good grounding for NCEA investigations and beyond.

In the students words, highlights of the experience include - 
The Capybara had chunky shaped faces and were quite big (Rhylee)
I liked the Capuchin monkeys; they kept swinging on the ropes using their tails (Jamie)
The baby Capybara moved really fast (Alex)
When the rabbits were lying down it looked like they had a large pillow of fur underneath them (Xavier)
The miniature cow was very cute. It had a large head and eyes (Sophie)
The otters were really playful and was very good at swimming (Nakita)
The Kunekune pigs lay on their backs when their bellies were rubbed (Ghermyll)

A huge thank you to the parent volunteers who accompanied us alongside the Year 7-8 teaching teams. Without this support we wouldn't be able to offer our tamariki these experiences.